De Soto City Administrator Mike Brungardt says Panasonic is poised to lead his city and the surrounding area into a new era of manufacturing prosperity as electric-vehicle battery production becomes the modern equivalent of the oil booms of 100 years ago. The center of that boom in northeast Kansas will be the $4 billion lithium battery plant that the company is now building on 304 acres of the old Sunflower Army Ammunition Plant, now renamed Ad Astra Enterprise Park. And because of steps De Soto has taken the past two decades, the growth will be aimed along a corridor that points straight west along Kansas Highway 10 toward Eudora and Lawrence.
Source: LJWorld
